Like all the traditional car manufacturers around the world, Hyundai is also making a tectonic shift towards electric vehicles. The brand introduced the furturistic E-GMP skateboard platform for its “Born Electric” cars. The Ioniq 5, which was launched in India and has already gained more than 650 bookings will be the first “Born Electric” car from the brand in the Indian market. We spent some time with the new Ioniq 5 in Goa and this is why it looks very promising.
Looks futuristic
The Ioniq 5 gets a design that sets it apart from the rest of the Hyundai models in the line-up. The design of the Ioniq 5 will become the inspiration to Hyundai’s future design. The overall design of the Ioniq 5 remains very simple yet very powerful. We drove the car on the Goan roads and the amount of stares and head turns that the Ioniq 5 was able to make bewildered us. Everyone wanted to get a view of the car.
The front gets a closed glossy grille that extends to become the headlamps of the car. The headlamps are also quite unique with pixel design. The advanced LED lamps look very bright and give the unique identity to the Hyundai Ioniq 5. Hyundai designers have used straight line sharp edges to make the Ioniq 5 truly unique.
On the side, the design remains simple but the strong lines including the deep crease of the shoulder line adds a meaty character to the car. The Ioniq 5 also gets massive 20-inch wheels with the parametric design. These wheels look mesmerising when they move. Hyundai has also used special Michelin EV Pilot tyres on the Ioniq 5. We will talk what role do they play in the car in the drive part.
The rear is also unique with the pixel lamp set-up. The tail lamps and the turn indicataors are dynamic. They move around as you engage the turn indicators. We really liked the stance of the Ioniq 5 and how it looks on the road. It is truly a car from the future.
A home-like cabin
Since the Hyundai Ioniq 5 is based on the E-GMP platform, it gets a flat floor. The designer have tried to make the cabin to give a home-like feeling. Just like you can move around the furniture of your home, you can move around the seats and even the centre console of the Ioniq 5. There is acres of space and there are different configurations that you can play with. We loved the zero gravity position that allows the driver to relax on long drives. While long drives on electric vehicles remains a dream for many in India due to the lack of charging points, it can be a useful feature in near-future.
All the seats including the rear seats are electrically adjustable and you get a easy walk-in feature too that pushes the front seat forward and gives a massive opening to the rear passengers to enter the car. The rear seats are 60:40 split and can be adjusted using the buttons on the co-driver’s seat.
The front seats are ventilated and heated. The rear seats get loads of space and even a third passenger can fit without any problem thanks to the extra space due to the moving central console. The rear passengers also get the window blinds, which do feel quite premium.
Hyundai has used an asthetically pleasing cabin colour with the Ioniq 5. The light shade with ambient lights gives a very soothing and calm ambience. While the massive moonroof, which means it is a fixed glass roof, adds a senses of openess to the cabin. The glass roof is massive and even the rear passengers get to enjoy the open sky over their heads.
Loaded with features, the Ioniq 5 offers all the features that you can ever imagine in a car. It includes two 12.3 inch high resolution display that are crisp and very bright even under the sunlight. The displays shows all the relevant information in a simple manner. It goes well with the aesthetics of the cabin.
Hyundai also offers a high level of safety with 60+ safety features. One of them is ADAS and we will talk about it in the driving part. Overall, we did not find any feature missing from the Ioniq 5. It is a complete package and will please the old souls who like simple design while attracting a lot of youngsters who are gadget freaks.
The Ioniq 5 also allows you to charge your laptop, phones or any other electric device with a load of up to 3.2 kW. You can even run airconditioner with it. The V2L or Vehicle to load feature can be utilised from inside or outside the vehicle. Quite fascinating.
Driving it around
While we stood there and admired the Hyundai Ioniq 5, we only wondered how it would be to drive it around. The E-GMP platform gobbles up all the batteries on the floor, which means that the centre of gravity is close to the ground. There are three driving modes in the Ioniq 5 and started very soberly in the normal mode. Before we tell you anything further, you should know that it is a RWD vehicle with 217 PS of peak power and 350 Nm of peak torque.
With the EV-specific tyres, the Ioniq 5 is really fun to drive. It picks up speed easily and thanks to the all disc brake set-up, you can slow it down as quickly too. The Ioniq 5 is quick. Hyundai claims it can do 0-100 in about 7 seconds. We did a run and you can watch the timing in the video.
Since it is RWD, you can get your part of the fun too. In ECO mode, the power subsidies and increases the range while in Sport mode, it become all angry and even more fun to drive. Honestly, I found the normal mode to have enough power to enjoy the Ioniq 5 but since changing the modes is so easy, I kept on playing all through my drive time. It is an engaging experience.
There are paddles behinde the two-spoke leather wrapped steering wheel that can be used to engage different regeneration level. At the highest point, the car goes into i-pedal mode that allows you to do single pedal driving. I kept it in the highest model all the time and did not move my foot much from the accelerator to the brake pedal.
The Ioniq 5 is a fun to drive car. It is well balanced, very comfortable and the suspension set-up is quite brilliant. Hyundai has increased the height of the car by 20mm for the Indian market, which will ensure that it handles the bad road surfaces well, which it did. Watch the video to know about how silent the car was during our drive. Hyundai has used special strategies to make the Ioniq 5’s cabin quieter than most other EVs.
As per the claimed ARAI range, the Ioniq 5 can do 621 km on a single charge. In real-world conditions, it will come down to about 450 to 50o km. Since we did not have the car for much time, we cannot comment on the exact range but even after throwing the car around with the climate control system working at its fullest, the range only dropped by 10%.
Hyundai will install an 11 kW charger for free at your home which can charge the car in just 7 hours. There is fast charging option that you can find on the highways. Using fast DC chargers, the charging time drastically comes down too.
There is Level-2 ADAS available with the car. Now under Rs 50 lakh mark, the Tuscon is the only car that offers well-executed ADAS system. The Ioniq 5 is no different. While we could not extensively test the ADAS feature, we did check the emergency braking and you will find it in the video.
A threat to the Germans?
The introduction of the electric cars has levelled the playing fields again. With the new platforms coming up, the German manufacturers, who are known for providing supreme driving experience is now under threat and the Ioniq 5 really shows how it is done. The Ioniq 5 is priced perfectly to bridge the void left by other car manufacturers and we truly believe that it is going to be very popular in the market with its price of Rs 45.95 lakh, ex-showroom. German manufacturers need to be on their top game to counter the new cars from the Asian manufacturer but at this moment, it looks like Hyundai is winning the game big time and is likely to remain ahead in the future years.